


boss battle (win the war)

by NotRyanRoss



Series: Nightmare!Verse [1]
Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, Music RPF, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 16:25:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6383848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotRyanRoss/pseuds/NotRyanRoss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>in which josh dun must go on an adventure to retrieve parts of tyler joseph's soul</p>
            </blockquote>





	boss battle (win the war)

"What the fuck do you mean, Tyler's soul _fractured_?"

Josh felt like his own soul was broken. And Tyler was holding the shards in his hospital bed. A coma, they'd said.

Pete waved his hands around in a frustrated manner and got up, starting to pace around the room, not making eye contact with either Josh or Patrick, who looked pale and uncomfortable. His boots were hitting the tile with ominous thunks, unsettling in the otherwise silence. Josh was still holding Tyler's motionless hand as the heart sensor beeped, slower than it should.

"It's, um," Patrick said, glancing back at Pete, "it's something that happens to us, sometimes. I didn't think Tyler's powers were strong enough to cause a fracture like this, I thought he'd be safe. Usually it happens later, like with Josh Ramsay or-"

"I don't care, Patrick," Josh said flatly. "Can we fix it, or not?"

Patrick folded his hands together nervously. "Well, I-"

"No," Pete cut in, eyes hard. "Don't you dare start him off on that shit, Patrick."

"I'm not going to lie to him," Patrick snapped back.

"Lie to me about what?"

Pete's fist hit a wall with a crack behind them. Patrick flinched but tried to look brave as he met Josh's eyes, his elbow near Tyler's knee. Josh turned his gaze to Tyler's chest, rising up and down faintly as his eyelashes fluttered.

"He...um, there's one way to get it back, but it's dangerous and we probably shouldn't-"

"Let's do it," Josh said abruptly.

Patrick gave him an aggrieved look that probably had something to do with the way he was constantly being cut off by both Pete and Josh. "You're not listening, Josh. You have to go into Tyler's mind and yank out the pieces back into his consciousness forcibly. You could die."

"Haven't changed my mind," Josh said.

"Didn't think you would," Patrick replied softly.

Pete whipped around, eyes catching the light streaming in from the window. Josh didn't flinch away from Pete's face being a centimeter away from his, but it was a close thing. "You're a fucking idiot. We did it with three people and we all died in that hell, and you want to do it alone?"

Three people...? What?

Pete was already storming out the door. Patrick gave Josh a sympathetic smile and patted Tyler's knee. He clearly knew Josh wasn't backing out, despite the risks of apparent death inside Tyler's mind.

"He's just worried about you. He did it once and it...kind of broke him," Patrick said softly.

"I'll be fine," Josh said shortly.

"Do you want to do it now?"

"Yeah."

"Get comfortable, then. It's going to be a long ride."

Josh settled with his back against Tyler's warm body, and closed his eyes.

 

_"Sometimes I just wanna hide from the world, y'know?"_

_"Yeah," Josh agreed quietly._

_Tyler was bent over the grand piano in the living room, hands dancing over the keys even as he didn't play anything. He was just...away, in his mind. Josh sat on the floor, passed him the music sheet he wanted when he motioned. Tyler poked out a gentle melody, still kind of stunted in the rhythm as the bags under his eyes made dark shadows._

_"Tyler! Josh! Breakfast!"_

_The corners of Tyler's lips tugged down almost imperceptibly, and Josh got up to poke his head in the kitchen. "Hey Ma, can we have breakfast in the study? Tyler's kind of...you know."_

_"Is he going to fall asleep with his face in a vase again?"_

_Josh laughed. "No, I swear, that'll never happen again."_

_"Sure, Josh," the woman said sarcastically with a sigh, handing over the plates of food. Josh took them and pointed upstairs, to where all the Japanese memorabilia was. He knew Tyler was unsettled in their living room, kept stealing nervous glances at the drawer that kept their guns._

_"C'mon," he said._

_Tyler smiled._

It was white.

He couldn't see the hair on his head, tugged it down to find dark brown hair. Hm. He'd been put in a red t-shirt ans shorts, fairly normal, with white socks nearly reaching the hem. He wanted his hat for some unknown reason. And he was apparently growing a beard.

There was barely anything here at all- Josh could see the walls and floor if he squinted, but there wasn't much. He looked around worriedly, searching for some kind of clue. There wasn't anything here, it was strange; he imagined Tyler's mind being loud and brimming with ideas, and this place was just...empty.

Eventually his eyes landed on a lanky figure bent over a piano, white balaclava smothering the features. Without even guessing Josh knew this was a fragment of Tyler's soul, recognised the blue t-shirt and the way the dark bands curled over his skin.

"Ty?"

The figure jerked, spasmed, and rapid-fire Japanese letters spidered out from where he was standing. Josh couldn't read half of it, it sped across the room and bounced off his feet with a sound like someone hitting piano keys too loud. He picked out some words as he twisted away from them, _they won't know_ and _you're ready._

The figure approached him cautiously, and Josh caught a hint of dark eyes and stubble peering at him from the eyeholes of the white material. He paused, and the figure held out something to him.

A dark balaclava.

_You can._

_"_ My hat," Josh said.

He didn't get an answer, just a stare.

He put the navy cloth over his head and the figure seemed satisfied, striding back to where he had been standing before. Josh watched as he began hitting his sneakered foot on the floor repeatedly, and looked to the side.

Josh's hat was lying there.

He strode over to grab it and tossed the balaclava aside, twisting the hat onto his head. Ah, that was better. He looked back at the figure cautiously and they were right next to him, the white cloth gone and replaced with blue tape. It looked _painful_. Didn't that shit get stuck to your hair?

The figure- the Tyler- silently held out a roll of tape, the same as the one they were wearing but red to match Josh's shirt and it seemed like a strange gift, but at least it was benevolent. Josh looked down at the tape and back up at the taped face, frowning.

The figure motioned again, a tiny smile on their face. Josh opened his mouth to speak but was hushed by a cold hand.

Josh sighed and took the tape. He didn't wind it around his face, just held it, but the figure started waving their hands about in a distressed manner. Clearly he wasn't getting out of this if he wanted this particular shard, so he reluctantly began to wind the tape around his face. It covered his cheeks, his hat, and finally his eyes, and he couldn't hear or see or do anything really, but cold hands clapsed his own, patted them once and he blinked and could see everything again, the tape gone. The white room was there again, but there was a piano in the center.

He looked down at where his hand had been touched and found a red and blue ring of colour circling his index finger. It felt like there was something _aware_ in the back of his mind, and at its direction he looked down and found a wire leading away into the whiteness.

He began to walk.

 

_Tyler had stopped speaking._

_Mrs Joseph had given Josh an unimpressed look when he'd come to visit, told him Tyler was sick and wasn't allowed visitors, so Josh climbed in through the window. Tyler left it unlocked and open for him anyway. He'd found Tyler sitting on the corner of his bed, face pale and tapping out something against the chipping paint with one finger. He looked out of it completely._

_"Hey, what's wrong?" Josh folded his hands in his lap as he sat down on the computer chair. It creaked ominously, but it always did that so he didn't move._

_Tyler looked at him reproachfully._

_"What?"_

_"Mom says I can't sing anymore," Tyler said emptily. "It scares my siblings. So now I'm just going to sit in silence."_

_"What...? She can't-"_

_"She can and she has," Tyler cut in with a dark look. "She stole my stereo, my iPod. Even the car radio's gone."_

_"I'll let you sing at mine," Josh offered._

_"What if we get caught?"_

_"It's not illegal to sing, Ty. We'll be fine."_

_"If you say so," Tyler said reluctantly, but his lips were curled up slightly at the edges._

The room was likely a bathroom, Josh deduced. Although he could only see part of it, where Tyler's figure was curled in a fetal position in the corner. It was illuminated by a soft purple light, and when Josh moved there was a wash of blue static, like there was interference. He took another step and ran into a wall that wasn't even there. What the hell?

He smacked his fists against the wall.

"Tyler!"

The shard couldn't hear him. There was fairly normal dress this time, just black pants and a white shirt, and that made Josh a little less unsettled. But he couldn't understand why he was stuck _here_ , when a piece of Tyler was over _there_.

His vision flickered blue again like static on a television and Josh banged his fist on the wall soundlessly as the shard of Tyler picked up the hair clippers.

His hair was how it had been early on, kind of scruffy but absolutely fine how it was, kind of cute, and when he turned the clippers with an ominous hum Josh began shouldering at the wall. It wasn't even a real wall, just something blocking him from Tyler and it needed to go, like, _now_.

The piece of Tyler- the shard- raised the clippers to his head and began shearing off lumps of hair. There was no finesse or order to the movement, just messy destruction. A trickle of blood leaked from a corner of their scalp where they'd nicked an ear.

" _Stop it_ ," Josh barked at him, smacking both fists on the wall. It may not have been a visible wall, but it still hurt his hands like hell. What was going on?

The clippers disappeared with a flash of blue static. The shard looked disoriented for a moment, then shrugged and slid one hand up to his half-shaved head, yanking at the strands forcefully.

The Tyler let out a pained hiss and Josh slammed his forehead against the wall and it shattered with a blue static jump. For a split second his eyes met the shard's, wide with shock, and then it ended. He fell onto the floor and the scene changed like someone had switched the channel on a television.

He looked up and he was on a stage.

There were people _everywhere._ Rows and rows and rows of them, filling his vision. Girls, boys, men, women, other people he couldn't quite tell, ones with makeup and ones without, all standing there and watching him silently. Judgementally.

He got up off his knees, stood up experimentally and shrugged off the pain in his hands. Fuck. Where the hell was the shard hiding? He wouldn't be able to find Tyler in here, there were thousands of people. Hundreds. Far too many.

"Tyler," he called out, vaulting off the stage to walk down the center aisle. None of the people around him reacted at his yelling, continued to stare at him dimly. He pushed a blank-faced teenage girl with blonde highlights gently out of his way and squeezed into a row, looking around frantically.

Time stretched on as Josh walked down yet another row of what were basically pod people, moving them out of his way. A fat man's hairy stomach brushed his side and he jerked away, running into a young girl on his other side.

Shit.

This was _not_ working.

He groaned. "Tyler Robert Joseph, get your ass out here. Please."

A white balaclava caught his attention, at the edge of the row. He ran for it, dashed for it because the owner was moving, walking away in a way that the others _weren't_.

He grabbed at the shard's shoulder and they jerked away, turning to face him. It was them, because the minute he made skin-to-skin contact the balaclava disappeared in a loud crunch of blue static.

"Ty, come here," Josh coaxed.

Because the shard was standing on the edge of a building, and all the people and the stage had gone, replaced by an emptier silence. The silence that came before a death.

The shard gave him a shaky smile and fell backwards, off the roof.

Josh ran after them, dived off the building like he was going swimming. Too late he realised the shard had disappeared, but as he fell his ring finger began to burn and he looked as a dark purple band wound itself around his finger and pulsed once.

Josh fell.

 

_"Do you ever feel dead?"_

_"Sometimes," Josh said._

_They were at their high school ball, Tyler in a classic tuxedo that looked extremely out of place on him and Josh in an old hand-me-down suit from his father. It was uncomfortable, they were uncomfortable. Neither of them had dates; they were only here because their respective parents had insisted they go, and it wasn't like they cared that Tyler was depressed and needed help. No, of course, a place filled with people he hated would surely fix it, Josh thought bitterly._

_"Sometimes I'd like to throw myself out the window," Tyler continued. "At night, the sill looks really nice, you know."_

_"Want to stay over at mine tonight?"_

_Tyler gave him a sideways look. "You just don't want me to kill myself."_

_"You're not wrong," Josh conceded with a shrug. "But maybe I just want to play some Donkey Kong."_

_Tyler laughed, the first laugh Josh had heard for a long time._

There was something over his face. Cobwebs, maybe, or something plastic, he wasn't sure. Josh couldn't see anything beyond it, just a weak white light, so he reached to pull at it and it was torn away by something, _someone_ else. More than one someone else, and it was strange because there'd never been other people before and strange because they weren't people at all.

The first thing he noticed was that there was no colour in this place, not even a little bit. It was purely shades of black, white and grey. He couldn't begin to guess what colour his hair was at this point, and he was wearing a suit, one that was weirdly comfortable considering he hated suits in all their forms and figures.

He moved and his foot crunched on something with an unbelievably loud noise. Josh looked down and found a skull. A genuine, human skull. Oh, dear _Christ_ , what part of Tyler's head was this? He could hazard a guess, but he really wasn't sure that he wanted to know at all.

A light came on, and the crowd swarmed in close to him, smothered him.

At first he'd thought they were just normal dancers, but then he saw the faces stretched into torn grins of death. He saw the skulls with sliced pieces of skin still hanging off of them, saw hair falling down to the floor from the gleaming bones. Their bare chests were human, skin and tattoos and muscle, but their _faces_. Josh reared away from one girl that got too close and she let out a melodic laugh and spun away from him, towards the others.

They were good dancers, Josh supposed as he attempted to wade through their twisting forms. They grabbed at him as he passed, pinching his cheek and yanking at his hair. He pushed them aside, ignored them until one girl stopped right in front of him, a ballerina, and all the other dancers disappeared. Fog swirled around them as he took in the shape of her skull, the clean angles of her body.

She pointed wordlessly to the left, took his hand and led him forward to where he could see a cloth-covered figure. Was that...?

The dancers appeared again before he could reach the shard, whipping away the cloth and revealing a suited Tyler Joseph. The tux was black, with a white shirt and bowtie, and they looked out of place and right where they was supposed to be at the same time. They were staring off into the distance emptily, like someone had turned the power off.

"Tyler!"

The figure met his gaze and grinned, as their skin started to peel away to reveal clean white bone. Josh covered his mouth as the skin slid off the shard's face and hit the ground with a disgusting slap of flesh. The dancers laughed around him and the part of Tyler in front of him laughed as well, beginning to twirl with them as they tugged at him.

Josh darted forward and grabbed the shard's hand and dark eyes looked back at him and the scene changed suddenly.

Suddenly, the dancers were all holding a rope and pulling, and the rope was a noose. And the noose was attached to the Tyler's neck as they gasped for breath and clenched tighter to Josh's fingers. The dancers tugged, and they slid back a few inches.

The shard looked at him with frightened eyes and it wasn't a skull anymore, just Tyler desperately holding Josh's hand like a lifeline.

Josh pulled experimentally, braced his feet against the floor and winced when there was barely any give at all from the skeletons. They yanked him back a few more centimeters and the shard let out a choked whimper, nearly falling on his face.

Josh took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and _pulled_.

The floor moved, rotated and turned sideways so he and the shard were standing on the _wall_ and Josh grabbed for their hand as all the dancers fell into darkness with a final cackle, pulled them close and _breathed_.

"Thank you for always saving me," the shard whispered, and then he was falling too, a new band of silver and black swirling just above the red and blue one.

 

_"This is where you've been hiding out?"_

_Tyler was sitting on a fallen log in the forest, bass settled around his shoulders. Josh wasn't sure how he'd known Tyler was here when all Mrs Joseph had done when he asked was give him a disapproving look. Tyler looked peaceful like this, though, surrounded by fallen leaves with a pair of sunglasses perched on top of his head._

_"It's nice out here," Tyler said softly, smiling up at the morning sky._

_"I guess," Josh agreed ruefully._

_"C'mere," Tyler said, looking at him directly._

_Josh did as was suggested, settled down next to Tyler and looked at him from the corner of his eye. Tyler smiled ruefully and slumped against Josh's shoulder, closing his eyes._

_"I've been thinking too much," he said tiredly. "I need help."_

_"I understand," Josh answered. "I think too much, too."_

It was white, blindingly so, and Josh closed his eyes for a few seconds, opened them again.

It was black. He couldn't see a thing.

_What the fuck?_

A large flash singed his eyes, blinded him.

It was dark. He couldn't see.

Then he could see but all he could see was white again, and the light burned his eyes and scorched his retinas and he shied away, back hitting something firm. Josh's hand scraped something rough and scratchy that pulled at his hands and ended up with a handful of what felt like wet leaves as well, the sounds of crickets deafening in his ears. He coughed, had the odd sensation he was being watched.

The blinding light turned off. Blackness.

Then it was on again.

It was almost impossible to adjust to the light change, and a throbbing headache began pushing at his brain, ripping at him. Josh linked the coloured bands of his fingers together and curled into a ball, a distressed sob choking past his lips before he could help it. He just wanted _out_ , he wanted to go home and play video games and bash his kit some more, and he didn't want to face any more of Tyler Joseph's demons.

"Tyler," he choked out, barely above a whisper. "Please."

The lights turned off.

He felt gentle hands on his face. There was wetness on his cheeks, tears or rain or blood, he wasn't sure, it just _hurt-_

" _Shh_ ," an echoing voice said. " _Breathe, Josh."_

Josh breathed. The light beyond his eyelids turned red, searing white, then black again. His heart rate slowed fractionally, and he slumped into the cold body in front of him with a pained whimper. It burned, so bad, it hurt so much and he couldn't, he couldn't do it-

" _Here."_

The cold hands slipped away, and then there was something being pushed onto his ears,the bridge of his nose. Glasses. But what did he-

" _Open your eyes,"_ the echo said quietly, so Josh opened his eyes.

He'd been given sunglasses. Dark ones, the ones he'd been wearing when Tyler- when he-

" _Josh,"_ the shard in front of him said wonderingly. " _Josh."_

Cold hands touched his cheek again, slid up to the corner of his eye. Josh winced at the throb of pain the action brought on, and when the Tyler drew back their hand, it was stained red.

" _Josh_ ," they said again.

This shard was dressed in dark green, a band of red around one bicep. There was dirt smeared on their face and down their neck was black, swirling on the skin. The shard smiled at him tentatively, sort of frightened-looking but at least recognising him.

Josh looked down and saw red bands around his wrists, a hint of changing colours at the hem of his shirt, the illusion of stripes. Mostly, though, it was black. A lot of Tyler's mind seemed to be black. In his lap was a pair of white glasses, round and vaguely ridiculous-looking.

The lights came on again.

It didn't blind him this time, didn't do much at all, but the shard whimpered and huddled close to him, close enough that he could feel the lack of a heartbeat. He wrapped one arm around them on instinct, pulled them closer. A drop of red leaked past his glasses and down his face.

The light turned off.

The shard flinched.

Shit, the glasses, of course, he was a dumbass. Josh scrabbled for the glasses in his lap, pulled them out and looked at the shard. They were twitching, eyes shut tightly, trying to back away into Josh's body. Thing was, they weren't facing him, they were facing whatever was trying to kill the both of them.

He slid the glasses on the shard.

Immediately the light came on again, but it was soft and green and illuminated the forest he was in gently enough that he could actually see. There was a lake at his feet, animals rustling in the background like they were real. Of course, he was in Tyler's hideout spot. A weight had disappeared from Josh's lap and he looked down to find the shard had disappeared to leave a dark green band around his thumb. He stood up.

The lake fizzed, bubbled.

Josh took a deep breath and dived in.

 

_It had been during the winter._

_"There's this person, in my dreams," Tyler had said, tear-stained and distressed from the bed next to Josh's. Josh had woken up to him crying, wasn't sure if Tyler wanted comfort or not. He was just laying there, staring at the ceiling with wide eyes. "I'm scared of him, Josh. He keeps saying weird things and he keeps saying he cares what I think of him. What does that mean? And he, he's bad."_

_Josh rolled closer so he could see Tyler's face better in the near-darkness of the room and frowned._

_"Who is he?"_

_"H...his name's Blurryface."_

_Tyler met Josh's gaze with trepidation. "And he's me."_

It was fucking cold. Like, frost on your eyelashes cold. He literally had snowflakes on his damn eyelashes.

Tyler's soul had seen to it that Josh was clothed in snow gear, luckily, and it kept him warm enough to survey his surroundings. There was a black scarf over his face, but his surroundings were coloured in muted blues and greys. Everything was covered with frost, and the fringe curling over his forehead was bright red. That could mean anything, though. His hair had been all colours and all shades and Nicolas Cage knew what Tyler thought of that, what this particular part of Tyler's soul thought of _him_.

Wait.

 _Tyler_. _Have to find Tyler._

There was a figure in the same white gear as him a meter in front, red beanie the same colour as his hair on their head. Josh took in the small, lanky form. Their delicate hands were stained black- _oil_? What was that stuff? Something wasn't right about this, he realised. This place didn't feel right, he needed to grab this Tyler and leave.

"Ty?"

He approached the figure, and when they didn't move he felt the chill creep up his spine like skeletal fingertips were dragging along it. Those black hands were sending off alarm bells in his head, almost like something he'd been warned about before-

"Tyler, we need to-"

" _Josh_!"

The anguished yell did not come from the figure in front of him, and that scream had definitely been Tyler. Which meant...

" _Josh_ , _run_!"

The figure turned, and it was Tyler Joseph but it definitely was not _Tyler_ , and as the crimson irises landed on him and a bloodstained grin came into view Josh jerked back. It coughed out a laugh, too deep, inhuman, dripping blood onto the white jacket. This was not the same thing Tyler had told him about one day, about the thing in his brain.

"Aw, Joshie. Scared 'a me? Don't you know?"

"I _care_ what you think, _Josh_."

"Blurryface," Josh said grimly.

"I'm Tyler too, you know," Blurryface said, advancing on Josh. "Is that what you think of me? That I'm not _him_?"

Josh took another step back. This thing in front of him wasn't right, he was disgusting and rotten and unnatural. "I-"

_"Don't answer him, Josh!"_

Josh turned as a flicker of black entered his vision, stark against the blues and whites and greys and reds, and it buzzed, like it was angry, before forming into Tyler Joseph. He was just dressed in a black singlet and jeans and he had to be _freezing that tiny ass off_. His dark eyes were focused and determined, though, and a single, glowing microphone dropped down from the ceiling with a clank.

There was no doubt this was Tyler Joseph, the one Josh was fighting to drag back to life.

"Tyler, I-"

" _Get to the drums, Josh! He won't come after you if you're playing!_ "

Tyler's image flickered again, like there was bad reception or something, and then the sound of static filled Josh's ears. He turned to find Blurryface right behind him, bloody grin right in his face. He could smell the decay on his breath.

" _Josh_!"

He jerked back, towards the flickering Tyler. "Where are they?"

" _The_ -" Tyler glitched out for a second again. " _Door to the left_. _Go_!"

Josh slammed open the door to the left as Blurryface let out a dark cackle and hands grasped at his scarf, pulling it down his face. It pulled at his throat and he couldn't breathe, then the cloth ripped and he was running, jumping over the drumset in the room and dropping down in the seat.

" _Play_!"

He played.

A web of ice, or glass, something, covered the space where the doorway had been. Blurryface's silhouette was still visible, stark black against the blue. One hand curled up to press against the surface. He heard him knock. His vision wobbled after the first touch of his sticks to the drums, rippled like disturbed water and started flickering to something else, other images.

Tyler was walking down a hallway, microphones dropping down every step with loud thunks. There was a hiss as a gas pipe exploded behind him, but he didn't flinch at all. His eyes were black pools, empty of light. He didn't look right, and he flickered out at every movement, but the echo of the drumbeat seemed to keep him moving.

Unfortunately, Blurryface was also moving. He'd given up on breaking into the room Josh was enclosed in, and instead went after his counterpart.

With every beat of the drum he jerked like it was prodding him with a fire iron, and Josh was helpless to watch as it drove him closer to Tyler, who turned to look at him. The black and white, black and _red,_ didn't seem right for either of them. It wasn't really _his_ Tyler, it was shards of him squaring off against each other for dominance and Josh wasn't so sure he wanted the dark-eyed one to take over after all.

The lights went out.

The microphones lit up where Tyler stood, and went black where Blurryface held his ground, swinging wildly and shooting beams of light around. The bloody mask grinned at Tyler, reached one black hand up to tear at his own face.

"I've been around, you know. I know everything you do. Those streets you like so much. Those people you love so much. And guess what? They're all going to rot away. Just. Like. Me."

"Because I'm evil, Tyler. Evil to the core, just like you. Because I _am_ you."

Tyler snarled, an inhuman snarl that was pure rage, and the microphones swung from side to side dangerously. Blurryface chuckled, and turned his face to the side, met Josh's eyes even though he wasn't there physically.

"Joshua, can you stop that incessant skin bashing, by any chance?"

Josh didn't stop drumming, physically couldn't stop the ghostly movement of his hands. Not that he was going to, if that was what kept Blurryface away. He didn't like the way either of them acted, but it didn't make Blurryface any safer.

A drum flew away from his set.

Blurryface snickered. "Can't play without your equipment, Joshua."

Josh kept playing.

Tyler surged forward like a wave, swinging one microphone glowing white at Blurryface's head like he fully intended to crush his skull in. Blurryface ducked out of the way, snickering as Tyler growled in frustration. His body flickered out of existence again, then returned with a sound like shattering glass.

"Poor Tyler. Are the parts of your soul you've collected fighting each other? Look at you, all black like you're at a funeral."

Tyler snarled and swung one fist, the hand flickering and going straight through his bloodstained counterpart. Blurryface tapped one finger to his own split lip, looking contemplative.

"Dear me."

A cymbal crash echoed through the building and the snow littered around the halls and the room disappeared with a wash of static. Blurryface's smile diminished slightly as he turned to eye Josh with those frightening crimson irises. He bared his teeth at Josh, revealing sharp, inhuman fangs.

Another drum shot away with a clatter.

Josh didn't stop playing.

The hallways lit up with a hellish orange-red light. Blurryface looked up at it, bared his teeth amusedly at Tyler, who shied away from it and let out a low hiss.

"Joshua, you know I'm still a part of your little Tyler Joseph, yes?"

Tyler dived for him, and Blurryface sidestepped him easily, slamming one boot down on his cheek and pinning him there. Only one dark eye was visible, filled with rage, and Tyler scrabbled on the cold concrete floor.

" _You're a monster_!"

"You're a monster, too, you know," Blurryface answered, voice distorting into something dark. "But that doesn't mean we don't have feelings. Don't you know, Tyler? I care what you think."

The third drum went.

Blurryface's jacket flickered out of existence, then his beanie. Tyler struggled weakly, pulled at the leg of his pants. Blurryface leaned down, smiled at Tyler almost nicely and licked his cheek, leaving a stain of blood and black gunk and spit down one cheekbone.

Blurryface screeched at the next cymbal crash, turned black, and disappeared. Josh stopped playing and the vision evaporated. He stood, shattered the foggy wall with one press of his fingers.

"Tyler?"

A snarl came from the dark hall.

" _Kill him_ , _Josh_."

There was a burst of static and the pictures changed.

 

_ "I would do anything to be a kid again. Like, I wish we could turn back time." _

_ "What, to the good old days? You sound like an old man." _

_ "When I was little my mom loved me, you know. She would sing me to sleep," Tyler said, eyes glazed as he stared off down the street. It had been a bad week for him; his mother was making him get a job, was kicking him out of home. He probably could have fought to stay, but he hadn't. He probably hadn’t wanted to: he was in a weird place right now, one that his mother couldn’t deal with and didn’t want to deal with. Anyway, he was fine where he was. _

_ He'd gone to Josh's house, of course. It wasn't like he had any money to buy a place. Josh tried not to be glad Tyler had come to him instead of anyone else. Tried not to think about blonde hair and a disgusted look, tried not to think about the bruise under Tyler’s chin. _

_ "It'll get better, Ty," Josh said, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and trying not to think about how fragile he felt. _

_ "Sure it will," Tyler said tonelessly. _

_ “It will,” Josh said determinedly. _

He was in his own house.

His family's house, with the old drum kit and battered drumsticks in his hands. His fringe still looked red, though, and when he looked down he saw the white shirt, the black skinny jeans he'd been wearing when Patrick sent him into this hellhole. Weird. Maybe he was starting to have some sort of effect on the constructs now. He looked around warily, kept his drumsticks close to his hip.

The doorbell rang.

He ran down the hall, slid on the wood and nearly smacked into the solid glass front door. He took in a deep breath, looked out. He was expecting Blurryface, he was expecting the black-eyed Tyler to tear out his throat-

"Josh, hi," chirped a teenage Tyler Joseph.

Josh stared.

Because this wasn't a war-ravaged Tyler, this wasn't a silent Tyler, this wasn't a dead Tyler or a demonic Tyler or a damaged Tyler, this was just a _kid_. His dark eyes (just the irises, not the whites) seemed to sparkle in the light and he was hopping up and down on his feet lightly like he couldn't stay still if he tried. He was wearing shorts and long socks, and even though they were black it was still so endearingly childish Josh couldn't handle it.

"Handshake," Tyler said cheerfully, holding his hand out.

Josh did it automatically, didn't think too much about it, but he was a little dumbfounded.

Tyler wandered into the house and Josh trailed after him.

He wandered into the living room, where a single microphone fell down from the ceiling. Josh gave it a wary look, but the teen Tyler bounced over to it, looked back at him expectantly. Josh gave him a slightly puzzled look and Tyler opened his mouth to speak, but there was a bang on the window and Josh turned and stared right at Blurryface, who knocked and grinned at him.

Josh dived for the drums.

"Let's play," the small Tyler said cheerfully, not even removing his backpack. Josh didn't quite understand how the relationships worked between the shards, but he certainly wasn't letting Blurryface touch this one. He was too helpless, too innocent, and Josh started banging out a rhythm as the shard near him began singing along.

A guy appeared next to the window where Blurryface stood, bobbing his head gently along to the beat.

He didn't look at Blurryface.

The young Tyler stopped singing. "Let's go outside!"

"No, I-"

It was too late.

Josh ran after him.

"Caprisuns!"

The younger Tyler handed Josh said bag of juice, kicking his feet a little as he sat on the sidewalk. Josh took the juice and sat next to him, looking nervously around.

Blurryface grinned at him.

"Wanna go to my house now?"

"Yes," Josh said fervently.

He took the drumset with him; the younger Tyler gave him a puzzled look but went along with it, and he didn’t make a move to help Josh at all, just sat on his bed. Josh took in the faintly concerned look and frowned. The shard was clearly picking up that something was wrong, but Josh needed to get him safe before it was too late. As he was thinking this, he heard the backdoor slam open. Shit, shit, shit. 

“Ty, you’re my best friend, man, and I hate ordering you around,” Josh said. “But you gotta come here, okay?”

The younger Tyler tilted his head, but got off the bed and drew closer, close enough that Josh could feel how cold he was. “What’s wrong?”

He didn’t have any other choice. “Everything,” Josh answered in a barely audible tone, his voice nearly cracking as he leaned down slightly to fit their lips together. The shard made a startled noise in the back of his throat, but sank into it and went boneless, and when Josh drew back there was a faintly glowing white band on his ring finger. 

“Why don’t I get that kind of treatment, Joshua?”

Josh eyed Blurryface from where he was standing above him, tried to step backwards nervously and hit a wall. 

The world broke down, and Josh found himself strapped to a bed. It was white, pure white, and his clothes were red, red as Blurryface was. Blurryface himself was standing over him, looking faintly curious in the same outfit as Josh, but with more blood and rot. Josh could smell it from where he was laying.

“The other shard has lost control of the world,” Blurryface said distantly.

There was a barely noticeable flicker and they were back on the street outside the house, Blurryface fitting a red beanie over his head and raising irises the same colour to fix Josh in place. Josh tried to back up, tried to run away from him, but he was stuck. Shit. This was how it ended, huh? With all the other shards making frightened noises in the back of his skull as he froze. 

He closed his eyes, smelt the scent of blood and decay, of gore and fear.

“He’s not complete without me, you know,” came a quiet voice.

The lights went out and Josh opened his eyes. 

Blurryface was looking at him, not doing anything at all but looking. The only thing Josh could see were those dark crimson eyes burning into him, and he tried not to shift away nervously. It didn’t actually look like Blurryface was trying to harm him. 

“I didn’t choose to be like this,” Blurryface said conversationally, settling his hand over Josh’s and smiling sadly. Was it sadness? Josh blinked and a red band began forming on his finger as he watched, and Blurryface reached up to thumb at the torn, bloody skin on his own face. 

“I care what you think, Josh,” and then everything was black.

 

" _Jenna broke up with me."_

_"Sucks," Josh said sympathetically._

_Tyler stared off into the distance. They were sitting in Josh's old beaten up car with takeout, Tyler's food barely touched and Josh chewing on the straw of his drink as he turned the ignition on_. _He seemed...not upset, exactly, just sort of contemplative for a guy who's first girlfriend had dumped him in public. The bruise was still there, the blood he hadn't wiped off dried on his chin._

_"You okay, man?"_

_Tyler returned his gaze to Josh. "Yeah," he said. "Sometimes...you gotta bleed, y'know, to know you're alive and got a soul."_

_"Alright," Josh answered, but Tyler had already passed out with his face pressed against the window. He let out a soft snore and Josh stifled a laugh as he started up the car._

Was this...Chinatown?

Josh stood up from where he had been placed in this world and looked around. He wasn't wearing anything different from what he usually wore, black shirt, and his hair was red. The light was normal, kind of sunny and cheery, actually, and that set off alarm bells in his mind. He squinted in the sunlight and saw something black out of the corner of his eye.

Was that...a shard?

With a start Josh realised it was the other Tyler, the dark one that had been in the snowy place, the one that had wanted him to kill Blurryface. Was this...this one's world? This Tyler was far stronger than the other ones, if it could travel around like Blurryface. Josh glanced down at the crimson band on his middle finger. It pulsed faintly, like it knew what he was thinking.

He watched the black-eyed Tyler as he stalked past, that oil-stuff staining his neck and hands. There were people here too, ones that were acting like _real_ people. They eyed the dark Tyler as he wandered past, with trepidation like he was a feared ruler of this domain, and Josh realised that he probably was. A dragon went down the street, swaying dangerously from side to side.

Then he saw her.

Wisps of white-blonde hair blowing gently in the breeze. Josh watched as those familiar high heels clacked worryingly on the street, white lace swirling around tanned legs, soft skin. A choker wound around a delicate neck. He felt his eyebrows fly up into his hairline.

A bang sounded and Josh glanced up to find the wooden supports of a building exploding outwards. The lights in the temple shorted out abruptly, and the world looked like it was _dissolving_. Was this normal? Shit. He looked back at the black-eyed Tyler, then at the girl.

_Jenna._

This was what was in the root of this shard? Jenna _fucking_ Black? _Fucking_ Jenna Black?

She turned down an alleyway, but not before eyeing the black-eyed Tyler unimpressedly, who stared back at her. Tyler followed- of course he did, and Josh scrambled to follow them. He had barely turned the corner into the alley when Jenna and Tyler both disappeared, and he sped after them.

He stopped in the doorway of the Chinese restaurant as Jenna sat in front of the shard of Tyler, and said something to him, words inaudible. The red lanterns littered around swung from side to side, slowly. The black-eyed Tyler said something back quietly and she glared at him, getting up.

Josh watched as the Tyler took a step back, showing not trepidation but _anticipation_ , like he wanted this.

Jenna Black grabbed him around the throat, right where the black was, and maybe it wasn't oil but bruises, layered over and over and over. The black-eyed Tyler didn't struggle at all, didn't react at all as she threw him down to the ground like a ragdoll and kicked him in the stomach. She laid into him like he was a punching bag, and he didn't fight it at all, spat out a mouthful of blood and stood up as she sucker punched him.

Josh didn't know whether he was supposed to intervene or not, whether it was right for him to mess with this. He'd avoided Jenna most of the time, knew nothing about her or Tyler's construct of her in his mind, just a faint idea that maybe he liked being pushed around by her.

Then she pulled the shard of Tyler up and kissed him, and Josh pushed between them.

Immediately the scene changed and they were outside again, the black-eyed Tyler blinking at him as Josh glanced around for Jenna. She seemed to have gone for now.

"It's my turn, then?"

Josh nodded and held out his hand, the one banded with rings of purple, silver, blue, red, green. Blurryface's dark crimson.

The black-eyed Tyler gave him a look something close to relief. "Good. I'm glad," he said quietly, and took Josh's hand. His body jumped, flickered like it had before, and he raised his free hand.

"Josh, it's - _not over-_. You - _need-_ to-"

He disappeared, leaving behind a solid black ring on Josh's middle finger, just above Blurryface's.

Josh blinked.

 

_"How do you know me so well?"_

_Josh looked up from where he was bandaging Tyler's slender wrist. The minute he'd walked in he'd known, had pulled back the worn cloth of Tyler's hoodie back and eyed the weeping cuts. Tyler didn't seem surprised that he'd known about it, hadn't resisted when Josh had dragged him to the bathroom to clean it up. Josh stared at him reproachfully until with a sigh, Tyler tried to elaborate._

_"It's like you're part of me, sometimes," Tyler said. "Like, you're you, but you're also me."_

_"How?"_

_"I can't explain it. You're just you, you don't stick to your lane, you go where you want."_

_"I don't get it," Josh said._

_Tyler smiled absently. "You're not meant to."_

He was in a dark street, standing in the shadows. He could see Tyler in the middle of the road, had a strange feeling that this wasn't a shard at all, just an empty carcass. It wasn't just the very _Tyler_ dress sense of floral dress shirt with dark clothes, it was the way the figure stood, still awkward but with an empty sort of confidence, it was the way Josh could hear crowds screaming in the back of his mind and lights flashing at the edge of his vision.

He approached the figure, stood in front of the nucleus of Tyler Joseph and reached his hands out, the colours in them starting to react and glow, surging like they knew this was where they were meant to be. This was it, he was finally done, they could go home and-

A pair of white gloves blocked his path and he came face-to-face with macabre white masks. They were wearing jumpsuits. One said _FAME_ , one said _SUCCESS_. Crimson gloves and gas masks obscured their features. Were these shards? They didn't look like anything he'd expect from Tyler, not that he'd expected any of this that much, really.

A knife appeared in his hand. Serrated, glowing faintly.

He withdrew from Tyler and looked between the white figures, whose labels were in Tyler's scrawling handwriting. They danced around him, fast, too fast, taunting him in voices that were echoes of Tyler's. He looked down at the knife, shining in his hand and lighting up his surroundings. What was he supposed to do, kill one? Kill both?

" **Which one would we pick, Joshua Dun?"**

**"Which one, which one?"**

**"What concepts do we bow to?"**

**"Success or fame, success or fame?"**

**"Fame or success?"**

**"Where do we stay in this lane?"**

**"This lane, this lane, my boy!"**

**"Where do we go?"**

**"Pick, Joshua Dun!"**

**"Pick a side, pick a side!"**

**"Kill!"**

**"Kill!"**

**"Kill!"**

**"Kill him!"**

**"Kill him!"**

**"Kill us!"**

"Shut the fuck _up_!"

The figures immediately fell both silent and still, and Josh tried to catch his breath, hands on his knees as he retched. He couldn't _breathe_ , the voices were suffocating him like they were pushing down his windpipe. His throat burned like someone had poured gasoline down it, and the white suited figures were still hovering over him.

" _What concepts do we bow to, Josh_?"

The voice wasn't bursting his eardrums, it was inside the furthest depths of his mind. Quiet, barely above a whisper and it was in Tyler's wry voice. _Tyler_. Beautiful, damaged Tyler Joseph with all his odd analogies and fear of guns and desire to run away. Tyler Joseph, his best friend, his _life_. Josh straightened. _His_ Tyler Joseph.

He knew.

" _We don't bow to these concepts_ ," he yelled, practically screamed it at the figures as he plunged the knife into his own chest and _twisted._ He kept his eyes open long enough to see the jumpsuited figures static out with echoed crackles.

And fuck, that hurt. He couldn't breathe again, couldn't take in any more oxygen no matter how much air he scraped into his lungs. He fell to his knees, couldn't feel his legs anymore, could only feel the ache in his chest, the blood spilling over his fingers. It was everywhere, seeping into his pants and on his hands and down his chin and he was _dying and it hurt, it hurt so much-_

"Josh?"

He coughed, hacked up more blood. Was that part of a lung?

"Oh my Nicolas Cage, Josh!"

So this was how he died.

"Josh!"

His breath rattled in his chest and then there were arms pulling him up, _warm_ arms, and he could feel a _pulse_.

"Josh, look at me. Open your eyes, _fuck_!"

Was it an angel? Nice. Kind of sounded like Tyler, though. He did as he was told, cracked open his eyes.

That was...

"Fuck, Josh," Tyler sobbed, tears practically pouring down his face. It was _him_. Floral shirt ripped at one corner, black jeans rubbing against where Josh's shirt had ridden up. His eyes were wide, distress and fear and something unreadable flickering in them. He noticed Josh's open eyes and choked out another sob, pulling him closer so their foreheads were touching, his tears grazing Josh's cheek.

"No, no, no, don't go to sleep," Tyler babbled frantically at him when Josh tried to close his eyes again. He was just so tired, and everything hurt so _much_ and he wanted it all to disappear. Maybe if he just went to sleep and never woke up again, it wouldn't hurt.

"Please don't go, I need you, _pleas_ e Josh!"

"'s...okay, Ty. I's 'kay, don'...cry."

"I'll cry as much as I want, you fuckhead, you're _dying_ ," Tyler snapped back.

"Nah...jus' sleep..."

"No it's not!"

A hand cracked across his cheek suddenly and Josh was wide awake, he was-

 

-Gasping and sitting up straight, sweat pouring down his face and soaking the sheets as Pete slapped him again. He panted, scrabbled across the sheets for something, he didn't know what. Fell down onto the cold tile on all fours, retched.

" _Dumbass_ ," Pete hissed at Patrick, who was in the furthest corner of the room, eyes huge and frightened behind his glasses. There was dried blood caked on his slender fingers, and a stain high up on Pete's cheekbone, sticking a few white-blond strands to his sweaty face.

Josh struggled to breathe. "Fuck," he choked out, the word barely a croak.

Pete turned to eye him cautiously, expression wary. "You alive, Dun?"

"Yeah, I'm good," Josh said in a normal, calm tone, before promptly hacking up a mouthful of blood onto the floor.

"Motherfucker," he heard Pete say in the background, muted by the rush of blood in his ears. "Did it look this bad when it was us?"

He didn't hear Patrick's answer, didn't care because he'd just remembered _Tyler_ , Tyler was Tyler again and he coughed and the blood splattered on the floor and then he was vomiting. It was just more blood, and he couldn't breathe again and someone was splaying a gentle hand on his back, rubbing softly.

"Shh," Tyler said, wrapping him in a hug. Josh coughed blood down his hospital gown and Tyler giggled, and then they were both trying to cry and laugh at the same time. Josh slid his hand up Tyler's cheek, felt the warmth from it, smeared his tears. Tyler beamed at him, wide and happy and unbelievably _alive_ in his hands.

"Hey there," Tyler greeted.

"Hi," Josh croaked. "You're here."

"Yep," Tyler agreed cheerfully, wrapping an arm around his neck and pulling him in for a kiss.

 

 

 

((original prompt by a friend: why does josh keep looking off into the distance nervously in the stressed out video, he looks like blurryface is after him lmao))

((Considered prologue is the Youngblood chronicles, ask and you may receive a fic for it))


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